To AM Radio

I’ve had all the NPR I can take for one night and I’ve got 30 more minutes on my drive home. I cannot listen to anymore Ed Sheeran or  Adele, lovely as they are.

 

So I hit the AM button to see how the other half lives. And by “half” I mean 4%.

It’s like the county fair of radio, utterly charming, profoundly useful, and yet terribly outdated. I expect any second now someone will start reading from the Old Farmer’s Almanac. And be right.

As I scan, I pick up mainly sports. A local high school basketball game called play-by-play with all the passion of the pros. Whoever this guy is, he knows this team and its history like a real fan. He must be sitting courtside; he knows the players. He knows their parents. They all meet for pizza after the game.

There’s sports talk radio also, which is almost impossible to hear, not just because of the static but because they are all talking at once: the two hosts and the person calling in. They are arguing over who is the best free throw shooter and disagree over which stats to use. One guy says you can’t just take the basic average because it really only matters in playoff games, under pressure. The caller disagrees. I think. I only make out bits and pieces, and two minutes later the voices fade to static.

And then there is Jesus. Jesus loves AM radio. Or AM radio loves Jesus. Somehow they have found each other in the 21st century. I scan past a lot of scripture quoting and fire and brimstone. But one preacher gets me. He is clearly close to the microphone in the studio as he talks and he is trying desperately to save whatever soul he can on this here frequency. He says our country is “antithetical” to spirituality. I agree with both his philosophical point and his use of the word “antithetical.” He talks about all the screens in our lives: our phones, our TV’s, our computers.

We need to put them down, he says. We need to spend a little time with God. Turn off the TV, he says. Turn off the computer. And then he says--he actually says--”Turn off the radio.”